The use of fertilizers in agriculture is well established and indeed, as fertilizers have been credited with enabling properties, modern society evolves from an agriculture-based society to an industrial society. The art and science of the use of fertilizers is well developed and in modern large scale agriculture, fertilizers are formulated for very specific purposes.
More recently, the role of various microbes in promoting plant growth has come under investigation. It has been found that the supply of certain types of microbes to the soil can have very beneficial results in achieving increased crop yield, increased mineral fertilizer uptake by plants roots, increased organic matter catabolism (and emphasing other beneficial factors to the plants) and also helping to overcome some of the soil depletion which occurs as the result of the use of artificial fertilizers.
Many different types of microbes which are beneficial to the soil are known including, for example, nitrogen fixing bacteria. Nitrogen fixing bacteria can convert or fix the nitrogen directly from the air to a form of organic nitrogen to be thereby provided to the plant for protein synthesis and also enriching the soil around the plants by leaving nitrogen material in the soil for later crops.
To-date, the application of fertilizer and bacteria to the soil have been considered separate operations, as liquid fertilizer and especially nitrogen contained therein is toxic to bacteria in large concentration. The application of fertilizer may be done in a dry form (most common) or by spraying in a liquid form. Similarly, the application of bacterial to the soil has been suggested using a dry dormant bacteria or alternatively, by mixing the bacteria with an inert carrier. Spraying is also practiced under various conditions such as in open field, directed to plants specifically or by injection in the soil.
One of the problems with spraying is that ultraviolet rays can have a deleterious effect on bacteria and thus it is important that the conditions be controlled, as part of the bacteria applied can be washed away by rain. Furthermore, the bacteria are often applied in a dormant state after undergoing a drying operation wherein a lot of cell damage occurs and the bacteria are therefore not at their most active. In fact, before resuming their activity, bacteria have a lag phase necessary to re-initiate the enzymatic systems or to repair the function of enzymatic systems damaged by the treatments imposed on the ferments to dehydrate them or during long conservation time. Most often, the conditions of treatments cause the ferments to only contain spores. The lag time (or lag phase) necessary for the bacteria to resume to their full activity can be up to few hours.
It would be highly desirable to be provided with a new fertilizer that would permit delivery of bacteria and fertilizer in a single step.